Here in Denver At Last

View From Denver Intl. Airport's People Mover—August 27th, 1:40 PM—Photo by LowerManhattanite

This Was The First Thing I Saw Upon Getting Off The Plane In Denver

Arrived early this afternoon, after a bunch of personal stuff got taken care of, but dammit...I made it. A travel fiasco or two later, that is.

Heard a slew of folks at JFK as I waited for my plane practically atwitter with talk about heading to the convention and the flight was great—so great that I wound up in Denver thirty-five minutes early (something that has not happened to me on a flight in five years), and encountered my first surreal moment.

I headed down the jetway to the men's room where “mid-stream” I was suddenly interrupted by the cheery, but setting-inappropriate voice of Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper greeting me and everyone else in the crowded bathroom to his fair, sprawling city.

I couldn't help but think of what sort of “in bathroom” greeting awaits the GOP's visitors when they hit the airport men's rooms in Mary Tyler Moore-ville once their convention kicks off.

I leave that to your fertile imaginations.

Good God. Did I say “fertile”? Well...

I managed to see Mrs. Obama's speech and upon doing so, immediately pitied the hell out of Cindy McCain and the task before her and her utterly unfurrowable brow. Between Sen. Obama's and his wife's borderline unfair oratorical gifts, I could easily see John McCain being driven into a fetal ball in the far corner of his basement—which Goddamned one of his basements I don't know, but knowing what he and his super-deluxe “Real Doll” wife Cindy face in topping the Obama tag-team of “putting the message across—bangin'ly”, I do not envy them in any way. There is NO “Great Communicator” to fall back on for the GOP—despite the desperate attempts to invade the burial crypt to re-animate the permanently somnambulant Ronald Reagan to save their pasty, flabby asses. Their best hope is Mike Huckabee, the “Keane-eyed” Arkansas yarn-spinner who while holding a crowd rapt, cannot help but make you shudder about that worrisome flash behind those big, vortex-like eyes of his. You hear the syrupy words, you feel their gooey embrace and when he's done, you check for your fucking wallet because let's face it, folks...he's just Benny Hinn toting around a bass guitar and a notch-collar suit instead of a Nehru-collared one.

And then there was Senator Clinton's wondrous head-fake speech that utterly pissed of a muckraking press corps last night. She dynamited temporary PUMA dens all over the mountains of Colorado with her in-your-face support of Sen. Obama for President, and her “No Way, No How, No McCain!” tag-line probably drove poor Harriet Christian to quaff her hundredth Drano-smoothie, but this one fortified with extra glass and stale fish-tank gravel. Which leads us into today's events which I was fortunate enough to be in the Pepsi Center to see where the deal was cut where she interrupted the roll call during New York's count to push for the unanimous delegate vote for Sen. Obama as the nominee. The dam burst. Hands flushed red with clapping, and the word “classy” came down like summer rain around us as Nancy Pelosi took the stage and ended the process with the vote's going unanimous at long last. Negotiated unity. Loud cheers, and a massive, roof-raising sigh of relief. Shoulders relaxed at long last and a rush on the food court was on.

They ran out of ketchup at the condiments counter on the food run after the nomination was formalized.

Ran into Kwesi Mfume, former Phoenix Suns great Kevin Johnson here entering Pepsi, and I would be remiss in not noting the large African American presence here in the halls. This being my first convention, I'm no media neophyte. I know the deal with camerafolk being hipped to where the “chips in the cookie” are, as they're scattered far and wide in arenas like this. But where I was hangin' I couldn't look more than twenty feet and not see a richly “melanated” face looking back at me. I post this sitting across a table from two African American bloggers at Georgia Politics Unfiltered and Indianz.com. It's a good day, and former President Clinton is on tap for tonight. We'll see if he can call down the old verbal thunder and empathy and as Rakim used to say back in the day, “Move The Crowd”.

All is preamble until tomorrow at Invesco Field...where this nation is on the verge on capping off the ceremonial aspects of nomination—and the final formal one—the acceptance of said nomination of an African American as the Democratic Party standard-bearer for President.

There will be a nice, healthy bruise on my body from someone pinching me hard when that happens.

Pinching me verrrrrrrry hard.